Encounters
by birsima
Summary: Sequel to 'Huntresses'. A destructive ghost coming through the portal gives Maddie an opportunity to get more information from the local ghost boy.
1. Chapter 1

Maddie looked at the sample bottle in her hand against the light. The organic test subject inside had gained greenish see-through qualities during the experiment.

After gaining partial yet interesting information about a ghost portal's effect on ghosts forming in them from Phantom and to some extent the Red Huntress, Maddie had taken to experimenting. After the first two test subjects had literally blown up in her face, she had roped Jack in and they had built a miniature model of the portal embedded in their basement lab wall. It was significantly smaller in both size and power it put out; similar to the proto-portal they built in college but with better safeties and energy output controls. It was the perfect tool for experiments like this, and completely functional as a portal if the ophiuroid ghost trying to stick its whippy arms through it was any proof.

So far none of the test subjects had changed in a way Phantom's loose explanation would've suggested, but then again, none of the test subjects had been living beings. Cockroaches were next on her subject list though, but she had been putting them off due to her son's resistance to the idea of subjecting actual alive things to large amounts of ghost energy.

Danny was in fact opposed to many of their experiments, and seemed to always know when one was taking place. Once he had even called her from upstairs to stop whatever she was doing. After that, they had diagnosed Danny as extremely sensitive to ectoplasmic imbalances, and from that day on Maddie made always sure to inform her children before an experiment so Danny could get out of the house if he wanted to. Danny's ectoplasm sensitivity might explain why he always seemed so unsettled by ghosts despite them being a common occurrence in Amity Park, especially in the Fenton residence.

That being said, Danny and Jazz were out for some quality sibling time, Maddie was carefully loading cockroaches to small-holed metal wire cages and Jack was assembling a new gun all the while humming off-key along to a song playing on the radio.

Maddie was just about to put two cockroaches inside the small portal on the workbench before her, when the alarm from the big portal on the wall began to beep loudly while flashing a red light. Both scientists paused immediately what they were doing; not many things would set off the portal alarm, and absolutely none of them were good.

Jack was already three steps closer to the portal, when the closed blast doors started to part slowly like something was prying them open from the other side with all their might. Foul-smelling smoke of unidentifiable color spilled out of the widening crack accompanied by an unearthly screeching. The usual green glow of the Ghost Zone was tainted with red and orange and something very big was definitely moving behind the slowly but steadily opening blast doors.

The two humans watched as a black glowing claw struggled its way between the doors, and backed off as an intense wave of heat rolled towards them from the now faster opening doors.

As another talon made its way through the gap, Jack yelled "Let's get out of here!" at Maddie. The doors flew open just as the two turned around and ran across the floor as fast as they could, and neither wished to remain to witness the black and scarlet monstrosity hauling its bulk through the beeping portal. Lower quality glass equipment exploded left and right from the heat the ghost brought in its wake, and Maddie and Jack made it up the stairs and out of the lab just in time as something bigger exploded either from the heat of by the monster's claw. Intense heat and ethereal screeches poured over the edges of the door even though the two scientists were pushing down on it so it wouldn't open.

"The lab shield!" Maddie exclaimed and dashed to the panel not far from the door from where the basement ghost shield could be accessed remotely in case of emergency like this, but just as she was about to press enter, the entire house shook right down to its foundations. The pressure pushing from the lab seemingly subsided as Jack who was still leaning on the door sagged a bit, but the ghost's infernal presence could be felt zooming upwards through the floors. Suddenly it was gone quicker than it had come, only proof of its passing the lingering heat and quickly distancing howls coming from outside.

"Let's go hunt that ghost!" Jack exclaimed and yanked open the door he had been holding shut seconds earlier and bounded down the stairs. Maddie followed with more hesitation, fearing what kind of sight would await her.

The lab was a mess. The portal alarm was still blaring, though distorted and a lot more anxiety-inducing than before. The floor, ceiling and walls were scorched and full of burn holes and some kind of claw marks despite being solid metal made especially to withstand everything short of direct nuclear impact. The portal control unit was throwing sparks, the floor was covered in half melted glass shards, boiled over experiments had stained their nearby areas with different splatter shapes of green, metal parts lay mangled on equally disfigured tables, and only one lamp was still on, flickering. The strong smell of sulfur, burned ectoplasm and overall stench of fiery disaster hung in the air. Surprisingly, nothing was on fire.

"Let's see if we can get the weapons vault open first, dear," Maddie said, noting the slightly deflated expression at the lab's state of her husband's face. "Everything in it should be intact."

After Jack's curt nod, the two set to carefully yet fast to clear all the destroyed stuff from in front of the weapons vault door. Everything was burning to the touch even though the tough latex gloves which thankfully weren't melting stuck to anything, and Maddie spared a few glances and several muttered curses to the lab computer, which was further away from the portal but still smoking gently, implying total destruction of all files.

Prying the vault door open was more difficult than usual, as the soft insulator material between the door and the doorframe had somewhat melted, but all the equipment waiting inside was intact.

"Ha! I told you building a weapons vault was a good idea!" Jack had gained back all his temporarily lost enthusiasm, and was rummaging through the array of long-range weapons in no time at all. Maddie followed slower, making a mental list of the few qualities of the monstrosity of a ghost she had managed to pick up and choosing her to go-arsenal with more care than Jack, who could carry a lot more on him than his wife.

Just as Maddie was reaching for another rifle, a furious knocking could be heard from upstairs, even in down the lab. "I'll get it," Maddie sighed and grabbing the rifle she headed out the vault and upstairs, quickly maneuvering the mess and already forming an answer to the alarmed citizen asking them to hunt the ghost who no doubt was behind the door. Another frantic round of knocks rapped the door as she entered the kitchen.

"I'm coming," she muttered as she reached the door and flung it open, but the person behind it was no average concerned passerby.

It was the Red Huntress. After the door was open, she zoomed right in, having never dismounted her hoverboard in the first place. She made a quick loop in the living room before turning back to Maddie.

"Mrs. Fenton, do you have a ghost shield that can safely trap the ghosts in?" she sounded breathless as if she had ran there instead of flying on her board, and her voice was just as frantic as her knocks had been. "It's really important and _really_ urgent."

Maddie bit down a comment about 'doing people's houses' and nodded. "In the Ops center, storage next to the fridge." The Huntress zoomed past her the moment she had told the location and directly towards the bedroom elevator going to the Ops center fridge. Maddie didn't spare more than half a thought to how the Red Huntress knew the layout of their house so well as she rushed back to the disaster that was the basement to drag Jack and a load of weapons up and to the ghost assault vehicle.

The Huntress reappeared outside just as the Fentons were hastily loading the GAV, holding a crate labeled 'ghost containment shield'. She set it in the back of the monstrous van and flew alongside the GAV, giving directions to wherever they were going.

"What do you need the shield for?" Maddie yelled to the Huntress over the wind. "That thing doesn't have enough power to imprison the ghost for a long enough time to drain it, and going inside would be a suicide if the state of our lab is anything to go by!"

The huntress spared her a glance. "I know, and shooting this thing only makes it angry." A sharp left. "We sicced Phantom on it, since he has his ice thing going on and that thing's like made of lava and plasma or something, but the countering energies made giant shockwaves and lightning, and we have to contain it for Phantom to kick its ass properly." Jack sped directly through a roundabout, and Maddie decided to not ask who the Huntress meant when she said 'we'.

Maddie could already see the damage from the shockwaves the Huntress had mentioned, and in the distance she could make out a dark red shape, billowing like a drop of ink in a glass of water and emitting the same screeching and howling as when it passed through Fentonworks.

As the GAV sped closer, she started seeing separate shapes vaguely resembling limbs and points that definitely were a black crown of horns. The thing indeed looked like it was made of crusted-over lava; the black surface was broken by constantly moving cracks of red, orange, and yellow, almost white in the middle of the widest cracks. The same foul-smelling smoke that had filled the lab was pouring from caldera-esque formations on its back and several orifices on what must have been a face. It was spitting huge mouthfuls of smoke, fire, ash, and overheated ectoplasm from two malformed mouths filled with uneven rows of black dagger-like teeth, all the while trying to hit a fast black and white humanoid shape zooming just outside the reach of its claws.

Phantom was throwing ectoblasts at his ever-changing fiery opponent and Maddie, to her horror, could see they did next to no harm to the monster. She leaped out the moment the GAV skidded to a halt and rushed to the back to get the shield, but the Huntress beat her to it and started to open the crate.

"What the-" the Huntress muttered as Maddie made it to her side. Inside were several beacons, eight to be exact.

"We have to dispatch them around them," Maddie explained nodding towards where Phantom was currently fluidly dodging the inferno being spat after him. "In a normal shield designed to keep the ghosts out the generator is inside, but a contained ghost could easily break it so it has to be outside. Eight beacons are needed to make a dome, and we need to put them in a hexagonal shape, this end towards the center. Understood?"

The Huntress nodded and tapped a few controls on her wrist. Maddie could hear the faint crackle of static before the huntress spoke. "Evac team, are you done?" The older hunter could hear muffled double 'yes' and one 'no'. "We need help putting up this shield." A cacophony of three responses. "Yeah. Come to the Fenton GAV."

Jack burst out of the bulky van with a bazooka hoisted to his shoulder as the two huntresses unloaded and started to pre-activate the beacons. He had still a terrible aim, but with a target as big as it was missing was hard. His threats of 'tearing the spook apart molecule by molecule' went to deaf and possibly nonexistent ears though as the beast was solely focused on Phantom, who in turn had taken to blocking with transparent green shields instead of dodging. He had his hands full with trying to contain the excessive fiery pyrocumulus the monstrous ghost was spewing in his general direction from damaging neither him nor the buildings around.

Maddie could barely hear a soft whirring sound over the noise the hot ghost was making, but as she lifted her gaze from the beacons, she could see two figures approaching on what looked like motorized roller skates, both wearing very covering dark clothing and helmets similar to the Huntress'. As the two, a man and a woman, came to a practiced halt she could see both had the same 'D' symbol on an armband as Phantom had on his chest.

The Red Huntress didn't miss a beat as she handed two primed shield beacons to both of them with the same instructions Maddie had given her moments earlier. The two nodded. "We'll take the sides," the woman said and Maddie couldn't shake the feeling she knew her voice. With that, the helmeted three took off, each carrying two beacons, rollerskaters splitting into opposite directions and the Huntress straight up, clearly to fly above the calamity they were going to contain. Maddie glanced at Jack still shooting at the monstrosity, and set to place her two beacons in their positions.

Just as she was done setting the first, Jack made a solid hit with something clearly important, as the beast screeched twice as loud as it had been, and flung a tentacle or a tail towards him. Maddie let out a warning yell, but before Jack could make it out of the way, the ghostly appendage crunched into a shield that had sprung up on its path. Maddie looked up to see Phantom, clearly struggling with focusing on so many shields at once.

Speaking of which, Maddie had seen Phantom control the shields with his hands, but he had five up at the same time, all in different places. How was he- oh. OH.

Phantom had solved the problem by not changing his way of controlling the shields, but somehow adding himself more arms. Maddie's brain started immediately churning methods of doing this, but she was snapped out of it by the sight of Phantom sprouting a sixth arm with a disfigured flash of light and lobbing an ice spear appearing out of nothing at the other ghost.

The scientist shook her head and continued on her way to the spot she had decided to place her second beacon in. Just before she reached it, the Red Huntress zoomed back. "We're all done," she reported. Maddie set the beacon down in its spot and began the group activation sequence.

"There. It's one push of a button away from activating."

The Huntress flew up and yelled at Phantom to 'move his ethereal ass into the hexagon'. Phantom nodded and made his extra arms disappear in a flash of light, most of his shields dissipating at the same time. He charged his fists with blue clearly cryogenic energy and charged at the monster still more or less on the ground.

"Press it," the Red Huntress said. "He's going in with ice, we need it now."

Maddie pushed the button and all the beacons came to life at the same time, a green translucent and hexagonal shield dome began forming between them. It was fast; each beacon pushing forward its own strip of shield, and the dome closed half a second after Phantom's collision with the other.

The shockwave from the two otherworldly elements clashing was indeed just as the Huntress had described, and more. The wave of energy hit the shield and since it was ghostly in origin, the shield contained it. A huge cloud of steam, smoke and ash exploded around the collision, and several lightning flashed within the cloud, few even hitting the shield.

After the initial collision the shield dome filled with foul swirling clouds of soot and steam and everything in between, most of it too ectoplasmic to pass through the shield. The smell came through though, as did whatever smoke rose from the burned asphalt below. Maddie cringed.

The roller skaters came back, this time with the third member that had been previously still occupied with getting civilians out of the way, a woman who'd be taller than Maddie even without her skates. As nothing she could actually see was going on in the dome aside from the occasional burst of light of louder than usual screech, Maddie decided she could interrogate the 'ground force' she now remembered existed instead of paying major attention to the fight. She would still watch it, of course.

"So, who are you three then?" she asked none of them in particular.

"We're Phantom's team," the shorter woman replied. "We get the civilians away and give cover fire."

"We're his sidekicks," the man summed, "and protect him from the fans."

"We also do minor ghost hunting without Phantom, but we mostly back him up," the first woman added.

Not the answers Maddie had hoped to get, but these three clearly wanted to stay anonymous. She had seen them help Phantom on several occasions and the local paper had in more than one time done a small article wondering who these three were, but to no avail, as they wouldn't out themselves. Two years ago there had been a minor scandal when a girl from Danny's class had claimed to be one of Phantom's helpers, but the rumor had been stopped after the three had been at a scene at the same time as her.

A ferocious thunderclap sounded from the clouded-over dome and the ground shook slightly. Phantom's form was smacked right into the shield and blasted with what must've been a full mouthful of scorching energy. Maddie gasped in slight terror as Phantom melted into white smoke against the green force field.

"Chill, that was just a clone of the real thing, made to be a distraction," the man spoke with a relaxed voice but his shoulders were tense. And soon enough, the monster's 'face' was plastered into the shield with an electrical smack, its head rooted tightly to its place with a plentiful ice covering, droplets of boiling ectoplasm falling from its lower mouth against the shield. After a few grimaces probably meaning a thorough beating to its backside, it yanked itself free with a loud crack leaving three horns behind. Maddie was about to returns to talking to the younger hunters, when the entire dome suddenly lit up in a blaze of green, yellow and orange fire. The hunters gasped, be whether it was in awe or alarm.

After the blaze died down, all the smog had burned away and the inside of the shield was clear. The monster was a lot worse for wear, bleeding the same golden lava-looking ectoplasm that had earlier been visible in places where the beasts black surface had cracked. It was lighter in color, black skin turned red and overall looked like it was melting. Phantom looked damaged as well, partly covered in a mess of ectoplasm and ice no doubt covering burns.

He made a few slow motions with his hands towards the group of humans, and the taller woman crossed to form an 'X' shape in response. _Sign language_ , Maddie realized. "What did he ask?"

The tall woman signed something to her in response. "He asked how strong the shield was, she told him 'no'," the shorter woman translated and jabbed a gloved thumb at the taller. "We don't want him to destroy that thing."

Maddie wasn't sure whether the woman meant the shield or the ghost, but had no time to think when Phantom broke their moment of stillness and yelled something at the beast. Maddie immediately recognized it as the language of ghosts as half of the noise that came out of the ghost's mouth seemed to be static.

Whatever Phantom said had definitely riled up the beast, as it let out an earsplitting screech with a big puff of smoke and glowed twice as bright as before. This must've been what Phantom was aiming for, as the moment the bigger ghost opened its mouths he charged up a giant ball of cryokinetic and ectoplasmic energy and shot it directly into the beast's maw.

The monster let out a gurgling yowl and a wave of the orange-yellow not-quite-liquid it was bleeding splurted out of its still open mouths. It hunched over and for the first time said something, even if it was in ghost. Then its glow started to slowly brighten.

"It's going to blow itself up," The Red Huntress whispered.

Phantom seemed to catch on too, as he froze and looked at the brightening monster. It was expanding too, and something was churning under its surface.

Phantom, big eyes wide in panic, dropped most of the ice covering him and darted to the direction of the closest dome wall. He does realize he's inside a ghost shield, Maddie thought.

Just as the volatile ghost monster reached its breaking point Phantom reached the shield but unlike Maddie had thought, he didn't smack into it. A white ring of light formed at his nose and stayed just inside the barrier. The beast finally blew up, engulfing the dome again in an inferno, and Maddie caught a small flash of black at Phantom's head before he _flew straight through the ghost shield_ , another white ring appearing just as close to the shield as the other, just on the other side. Maddie's jaw dropped and he heard Jack exclaim somewhere to her left. Phantom crashed into a building head first and would've fallen face first on the ground had the Red Huntress not swooped down to catch him. The Huntress gathered the battered ghost on her arms bridal style and shot off to the sky.

"Where are they going?" Maddie asked the shorter masked woman who seemed to be the black clad group's most vocal member.

"Red knows and can get to most of Phantom's favorite places in his haunt. She's taking him somewhere quiet to fix him up."

Maddie didn't quite understand why a ghost would need 'fixing up' in addition to resting and recovering lost energy, but decided it must be a 'portalborn' thing since the real world matter in him might slow down the healing process. It would be most enlightening to see the damage Phantom had suffered during the fight. It was kind of messed up, but seeing his wounds might be the closest thing Maddie could come to seeing how the ghost worked with their truce-deal.

"Do you want to dissect what's left of this ghost?" Jack's excited yell derailed her train of thought. She looked at him standing right outside the still-on shield like a puppy waiting for a walk.

"Sure, darling, but I have to take care of something first and we need new equipment." With that, Maddie walked over to the hastily parked GAV in search of her trusty modified Fenton finder. Jack exclaiming "I'll collect the samples!" went to deaf ears when his wife found the device and began jogging on a steady pace to where the green radar screen showed two red dots.

* * *

 **AN: I have no concept of putting the plot's climax towards the end. There will be more of this and I am doing my best but I am a literal potato so it might take a while. Or not; you'll never know.**


	2. Chapter 2

In normal situations, the receptionist of the fancy hotel Maddie's radar directed her into wouldn't have let such an oddly dressed and dirty woman in, but being a ghost hunter in Amity Park gave her certain privileges. It wasn't written anywhere, but when a ghost hunter came in in a hurry, nose buried in a ghost detector and carrying at least one ectogun, you let them pass, and Maddie had two rifles strapped on her back.

She checked the detector screen one more time before making a beeline for the elevator. Quickly calculating the height readings from the detector compared to the room height and number of floors displayed on the elevator button panel, she chose the top floor.

Once out, the scientist looked around to find the best way to reach wherever she had to go from there, and chose the left corridor. After a minor hotel maze she was faced with a door labeled:

Room 906

Reserved for V. Masters

It made sense in a way. If Phantom knew what was currently going on in the realm of humans and especially Amity Park, which he clearly did, coming across this room was a jackpot. Vlad Masters was filthy rich and didn't leave Wisconsin very often, so the room would stay maintained yet uninhabited for most of the time, especially when Vlad always did his best to try to stay the night at the Fentons. Admittedly, Maddie had thrown the man out in the middle of the night in more than one occasion, which probably was the reason the room was reserved for him in the first place.

After her quick mental explanation, she turned her gaze from the sign to the small number lock located where most hotels had a slot for a card. Thinking the most probable code, she punched in her own birthday and to her not-surprise, the lock opened with a barely audible click.

Sneaking in as quietly as she could and still following the detector, she started hearing voices from the two she was currently stalking.

"-at's taken care of, where's the side hit you mentioned- no, don't move, you'll disturb the tape."

"It's on my serratus anterior and latissimus dorsi, here under this ice-"

"Speak English, spook. I don't understand Latin."

"Hey! Those are legitimate and approved names for those muscles in the English language. You'd know them if you didn't sleep through the biology course."

"And whose fault is that? It wasn't a priority. How do you remember them? If I remember correctly you-"

"Shush. We've got company."

Maddie had thought she had been quiet enough in her approach, but Phantom had clearly heard her. Deciding coming out in sight by herself was the best course of action, she walked around the two corners still between them.

Taking in the sight before her, she saw Phantom sitting on a chair, or floating an inch or two above it, barefoot and missing the top half of his jumpsuit, tape holding shut a nasty looking green gash on his shoulder. The rest of his torso was covered in smaller scrapes and scratches; some of them taped shut, and burns of different severity, shape, and size. Most of his right side was covered in ice tinted green by ectoplasm no doubt flowing from the burns under it. Maddie took notice on how she could see no trace of phantom's boots or the top half of his suit in the room, nor could she see the two shirts she had seen the ghost to wear under it.

The Red Huntress stood in front of the ghost, looking caught off-guard and like she had just barely managed to put on her helmet in time. Her board was nowhere to be seen, and the door to a luxurious balcony was open. On the floor was a small pile of paper towels soaked in ectoplasm, and a small damp and only slightly ectoplasm-stained towel sat hastily discarded on the floor. If Maddie had to guess, the Huntress had been cleaning Phantom's wounds with it seconds earlier.

The guarded look in Phantom's face turned into one of surprise and for some reason, excitement. "Maddie! I wasn't expecting to see you here. Well, better than room service." The ghost chuckled, but stopped after a hiss of 'stay still' from the Huntress. She turned to face Maddie, crossing her arms.

"What are you doing here," she asked though it sounded more like a statement than a question. The scientist took note of the hostile undertone and lifted her hands reassuringly.

"I'm not here to hurt him. We have an agreement of sorts, I don't shoot him and he doesn't shoot me. I just have a lot questions."

The Huntress lifted a barely visible eyebrow under her visor and turned to the ghost snickering behind her. "You did the fire handshake, didn't you?" Phantom's smile widened into a mischievous grin displaying the row of his pointy impossibly white teeth, though covered in his green blood. "You should've seen her face."

Maddie frowned. "You mean that thing was a joke and not an actual binding contract?"

Phantom looked at her and somehow managed to give her the impression of expressive shrugging trough his eyes only since the Huntress was keeping a sharp eye on him watching he doesn't move a muscle, which he apparently had. "Deal is a deal. I guess it's possible for me to make a real-real demon contract thing that either of us physically couldn't break if I really put my core into it, but that would be a waste of time and energy. The fire was just dramatic effect, and it wasn't even real fire."

The scientist sighed, sat down on a nearby chair, and took off her hood. She had no reason to hide behind an alter ego like the Huntress clearly had, and showing her face fully was a sign of non-hostility. The Huntress gave a barely visible nod and while she still seemed uncomfortable with Maddie with them, picked up the damp towel and motioned Phantom to uncover his right side from the ice.

Phantom obeyed and turned slightly in the air so the Huntress could reach the wounds better, confirming Maddie's suspicions of him possibly floating. It was fascinating to watch; Phantom had complete trust in the Huntress, despite him being clearly wounded, severely at least in human standards and judging by his looks. If the 'blood' weren't green but red, Maddie would've possibly gagged at the sight of burned flesh and the long gashes in it, but in her research she had come accustomed to the look and smell of mangled ectoplasm long ago. Never like that, though.

"Why don't your wounds just heal and close up like other ghosts?"

The ghost rolled his eyes, the almost only movement the red-clad hunter allowed him. "I do, my energy replenishes a lot faster than most, but my body comes a little bit slower since, you know..."

"...Since you're a portalborn."

"Portalborn? I wasn't born in that portal, I died in there. I was thinking along the lines of 'organic ghost'."

Maddie had to admit, it was a better term. "I came up with it in a hurry."

Phantom rolled his eyes the other way and hissed as the Huntress closed a gash on his side with medical tape, probably at the feel of it against his burned skin. "But yeah, I'd go with organic because I have organic real world matter in me. Besides, it sounds more scientific. It's slower to heal than pure ectoplasm the other guys are made of, but it has its good sides, like better durability and energy distribution and it holds form better."

"And somehow allows you to pass through ghost shields without a hitch." Finally, she was getting to what she really came to ask about.

Phantom let out a small nervous laugh. "I was kinda hoping you missed that," he said. "But yeah, it does. I don't know how the organic and ectoplasmic molecules rearrange themselves to pull that off, but it takes a lot of concentration to do it."

Maddie frowned. That was not something she'd wanted to hear, but like the ghost had himself said earlier, she was the ghost scientist here and could not expect scientific talk from someone more known for his skills as a fighter. He seemed to know a lot about human biology for someone like that though.

She hummed an agreeing noise. "That reminds me, how do you know the names for human muscles? I'd think you have no use for human biology since you're a ghost and not a human."

Phantom shrugged, this time normally with his shoulders and earning a warning beep from the Huntress. "You know a lot about ghost biology for a human. It's useful knowledge to me, since I'm not only extremely human-shaped on the outside as you've 'gracefully' informed me, but to some degree on the inside as well. Knowing the- Red, do air quotes for me, thank you- knowing the building blocks gives me creative freedom with my body during the fights I get into. Sometimes reshaping a limb or temporarily creating a new one is something that can save you from getting gutted or beheaded. And since I'm more solid than the average ghost, that stuff hurts AND bleeds a lot more.

"Another reason is to better keep those getting hurt in the fights safe. I do my best so nobody gets hurt, but every now and then someone does, and a quick thorough assessment of damage can save lives. I can tell from far away whether someone is seriously hurt or just hurting." The ghost sighed and deflated a bit on his not-so seat in the chair, but his carefulness of not disturbing the Huntress still tending to his side or the already taped-shut wounds made it look almost comical.

"Even though I'm a ghost, I'm more or less shaped like a human. Knowing the biology helps me determine whether or not the wound I happen to have would kill one, and who is the priority who has no time to wait for an ambulance."

Of course Maddie had seen Phantom rarely carry people away after some fights or accident scenes he had showed up on, but at the time she had thought he was kidnapping them. But now, considering all the new information she had on the ghost and re-examining those memories, she believed him.

A little girl in a red-blotched dress, cradled like a bouquet of roses on the ghost's arms, directly headed for the nearest hospital. An older man, head limp and nested on the crook of the ghost's arm, carried away bridal style. Maddie barely even registered the wall she was staring at. All the time she had been hunting him, he really had been saving the people of this town over and over and over.

put line?

Maddie didn't know how long she stared at the wall re-evaluating her judgement and morals but when she began to take notice of her surroundings once again, Phantom's right side was covered in ice again, though this time it wasn't green from leaking ectoplasm, and the Huntress was taping something in his foot with one hand while signing something with the other.

"Why are you speaking in sign language?"

The Huntress looked up from the now taped foot. "I didn't want to disturb your nap, and focusing on my hand keeps this idiot still." She pointed an unnecessary thumb at Phantom since the both women knew who she meant, while he scoffed in mock offence. Maddie nodded and couldn't help smiling a bit at the ghost's response.

She was pretty sure that had Phantom been human, he might've been friends with her son. They were the same age at least for now, and while they otherwise had very little common as far as Maddie knew, they seemed much the same personality wise. But as things were, Danny was uncomfortable around ghosts and the only time she had seen the two in close proximity of each other, he had looked extremely disturbed by the ghost's presence, even though he supported him in general.

Thinking about it, Danny's sensitivity to ectoplasmic imbalances might just make Phantom impossible to be around. The ghost was partially composed of real world matter which was since recently never heard of before, since it didn't just accidentally mix with ectoplasm. While neither Phantom nor his form was in imbalance on their own, his very existence as he was was an inconsistency in how ectoplasm worked. She could only imagine how her son would've felt if he was this close to the ghost.

Realizing she had zoned out again, Maddie refocused on the scene before her. The Huntress sat on the chair Phantom had occupied not long ago and was signing something to him at alarming speeds. The ghost didn't look one bit bothered by the fact he had no chair to sit above, and sat in the air as if he never even noticed his seat was gone, responding to the Huntress with equally fast one hand motions while keeping the said hand as still as possible.

"Why are you speaking in sign language?" Maddie asked. "At all. Why use it when you can speak normally?"

This time, the Huntress responded. "It's good when you have to communicate through longer distances where yelling would be a bad idea, or while fighting against a blind opponent. Or, you know, when you meet someone deaf or mute you need to talk to."

"Or for talking about private matters in front of someone who doesn't understand it."

Maddie turned her head from the Huntress to the still topless ghost. "What were you talking about then?"

Phantom lifted an eyebrow. "It's private. We made a deal but that doesn't mean I have to tell you everything happening in my afterlife." He signed something quick to the Huntress while keeping eye contact with Maddie, but looked like he was just barely holding laughter. But when the younger woman snorted at whatever he had said, he burst into laughter and tipped sideways in the air.

Maddie stared at the two laughing ghost hunters in front of her, adopting her 'disappointed mom'-look with ease at their teenage behavior. While she had talked to both of them before, this was the first time she saw their interaction outside the graceful battle tactics they displayed over the city. A thought popped to her mind.

"Are you two together?"

Phantom's laughter only intensified and he fell over all the way, hitting his head on the floor with a barely audible thunk. The Huntress, who was only giggling in the first place, sobered quickly and shook her head. "No. That would end in a disaster."

Phantom got his giggles in control and floated up, not bothering to flip himself right side up. "Totally. Probably not for us, though." He either didn't notice or just didn't care that a gash on his side had begun to bleed again from the laughter. The Huntress, however, did.

"Now look at what you did," she muttered, to whom Maddie did not know, and walked over to Phantom. She flipped him right side up and picked up the now a lot greener damp towel from the floor to reclean the bleeding wound. "Pass me the tape."

Maddie almost got up to get it for her, but Phantom beat her to it. With a flick of his wrist the roll of tape gained the green aura of possession and floated right to the Huntress' hand.

Although Maddie had both seen and felt ghostly possession before, it was interesting to see it used outside of dangerous situations. She had never really spared thoughts to the practical everyday uses of a ghost's abilities, mainly because she had always seen ghosts as malicious and unnatural to this world, but they could come in handy...

Maddie mentally shook herself. She would not succumb to ghost envy. Although after her miniature portal experiments, if it was still intact that is, she could look deeper into ectoplasm's gravity-defying properties.

In the meantime, the Huntress had returned to her seat and was tapping away on a miniature screen that had appeared on her forearm. Maddie couldn't see the screen very well, which most likely was intentional, but what little she could see looked like a chat window. Is she had to guess, which she did, she would've guessed the Huntress was talking to the other three members of their apparent team. With the younger woman occupied, she turned her attention back to Phantom still sitting in the air.

"So, how quickly do those heal?" Maddie asked, gesturing to the several cuts, bruises, burns, and gashes littering the ghost's ethereal skin. Most of the smaller cuts had already vanished, the taped-shut wounds looked old save for the one opened from gut-wrenching laughter, and the burns had dulled a lot from the bright neon green their bleeding had painted them.

At this point, Maddie completely understood Phantom's need for understanding the anatomy of the living; his wounds acted as if he were human, although several times faster. Where the living would require stitches and a thick cover of bandages, he just needed to clean his wounds and tape them shut, or get the Huntress to do it for him. All the damage he suffered made him look a lot more human in some way, even if the 'blood' was green.

Phantom shrugged, a movement the Huntress clearly allowed him already if the lack of objection was anything to come by. "I never took a time, but these should be all right tonight and completely disappeared in two days or less."

"You mean your wounds scar first?"

"I thought we already agreed my body heals the human way because I'm organic," Phantom pointed. "The universe has to give other ghosts at least some advantage over me."

"You're making it sound like you're superior to all the other ghosts."

Phantom made a noise between a scoff and a laugh and rose half a foot in the air. "Not to brag, but have you seen me fight?" The ghost had a slightly disbelieving expression on his face. "I don't claim to better than them because I'm not really, but it's a fact that I am more powerful than most ghosts I've met, and that's a lot."

"Most ghosts?" Maddie was grabbing onto the promising bit of information like a starved vulture. "How many ghosts are in the Zone that are stronger than you?"

Phantom shrugged expressively. "Strength is subjective. Even if I knew the exact amount of people there that could totally kick my ass in one way or another, I couldn't give you a number of who are really stronger than me. Besides, power and strength are two different things. With humans strength is physical and power's not. It's the other way with ghosts; power is physical and strength isn't. Or as physical as anything gets with us, whatever. The point is we're, or in my case mostly, beings of energy. We are power. To us, strength is strength of character, bravery, experience and all that. Power is this," the ghost lit up his left hand with a small swirling ball of green energy, "abilities and such. I assume you mean 'power'."

Maddie nodded.

Phantom paused before continuing. "I might be persnickety, but when talking with and of ghosts, strength and power just are two completely different things. But as for your question, I can only say for sure that compared to the amount of ghosts in the Zone, hardly anyone. As someone who knows quite many of them, a lot. There's probably a lot I don't know of. The Zone is vast."

"You weren't that philosophical when _I_ asked the same."

Phantom whirled around to look at the Huntress who had spoken, his hair flowing around the movement like underwater. "That was _three_ years ago! I've had at least some character development in three years and as someone who has known you then I can say so've had you. Besides, you've been to the Zone; you know how stuff works there."

Maddie would have to make an excursion to the Ghost Zone. That is, after the lab was repaired. In hindsight it was absolutely unacceptable that the Fenton portal had been operational for approximately five years now and neither she nor Jack had gone through it. The times their house or town had accidentally or otherwise unwantedly been transported to the Zone didn't count; a fully scientific operation was needed. Speaking, or rather thinking, of the scientific method, Maddie had one more important question for Phantom she could think of at the moment.

"Phantom," the scientist started, and the ghost in question turned around his axis once more to face her. "I have one more question before I have to return to take care of the damage that other ghost made. How did you make more arms for yourself?"

Phantom's face adopted the approximate expression of a ten-year-old showing their parents something they were proud of. The Huntress rolled her eyes. "I was kind of hoping you'd notice that," Phantom grinned. "It's a bit more advanced version of what I showed you in the park some weeks ago. And when I say a bit, I mean a lot. Anyway, you know I can duplicate, right?" Maddie nodded; she might not have seen much of said power, but she knew the ghost could do it. "My first attempts at it were less than glorious, like growing a second head and stuff like that. So at some point I realized I could focus on that too, instead of just duplicating the whole me."

"Can you show me?" Maddie asked. "I definitely saw you do it, but it _was_ further away in the heat of battle."

Phantom laughed, " _Heat_ of battle, good one. I can show you, but not right now. I already re-opened one of these-" he gestured to his closing wounds, "and extra use of energy while recovering from a fight would be stupid. While it might be more convenient for you, I prefer not to invoke Red's wrath again." The ghost jabbed a thumb over his shoulder at the Huntress, who nodded and crossed her arms as if to challenge Maddie to ask about it further. She wanted, but 'invoking the Huntress' wrath' didn't sound like a good idea.

"Alright," Maddie sighed. "Is tonight far enough for you? This is an interesting power and I wish to understand it better." Two months ago Maddie wouldn't have dreamt of making time sensitive plans with a ghost, let alone Phantom. But here she was, planning.

Phantom nodded slowly. "Yeah, I think so. If nothing attacks me, I'll come around."

Maddie nodded in return. "Then it's agreed."

Phantom got up, or as 'up' as someone not sitting on anything in the first place could. He rolled his shoulders and assumed the position of not-quite standing most humanoid ghosts tended to float in. The same ring Maddie had distantly seen when he passed through the ghost shield appeared at Phantom's waist before splitting and traveling simultaneously up and down the ghost's body, returning the missing pieces of his attire. It was fascinating to see the skintight top half of his suit appear, as if the ring was painting his skin black.

"What's the ring for?" Maddie couldn't help asking. Phantom looked momentarily down at his chest, "That? As far as I know, it accompanies most of the changes in my look and molecular structure. Anyway, I think we have to go."

True to his words, the Huntress' wrist had started beeping quietly. She jumped up, and her hoverboard materialized under her feet with and electric crackle while Phantom cleaned up the ectoplasm-soaked paper towels into a trashcan with ghostly possession.

The ghost gave a quick wave and a 'see you tonight' at Maddie, and the ghost hunting duo zoomed out of the hotel suite, the Huntress through the open door and Phantom intangibly through the glass wall.

Maddie shook her head at the hasty departure, and moved to close the still-open balcony door before returning to the hallway outside the suite. Down in the lobby she informed the receptionist that the ghost was no longer inside the hotel, not feeling the need to elaborate that the ghost in question was more likely than not frequenting the top floor.

Once outside, she opted to return directly to Fentonworks as Jack probably had collected whatever he wanted to study of the remains of the large volcanic ghost already and thus returning to the site would be unnecessary.

 **AN: I'm working on the next chapter, but now that school's started again we'll see how it goes.**


	3. Chapter 3

Maddie paced in the destroyed laboratory, quietly cursing all things ethereal and ectoplasmic. The damage done to the basement was something Maddie hadn't even thought to be possible; the walls were made to stand a nuclear attack, and a single ghost, although it was a powerful elemental one, had managed to destroy it almost to the point of it being beyond repairable. The wall paneling of two walls and half the ceiling had to be changed, the portal's blast doors renewed and Maddie didn't even dare think what replacing the equipment would cost. The files on the computer were probably lost forever, but luckily whatever physical documents they had were in a shelf against the wall furthest from the portal and intact.

The portal's genetic lock and locking mechanisms in general were functional, as was the miniature portal Maddie had been performing experiments with earlier in the day. The big portal's alarm was damaged, but they had decided to let it be as it sounded a lot more urgent as it was. At least for now, since it wasn't a priority.

Maddie also felt a little bad for leaving the scene so quickly and leaving the cleanup to her husband and whoever were behind the masks of Phantom's ground squad. Jack had assured her that they were fine and that he got a whole lot of good dissectable samples and that going out to study an unknown type of ghost was completely reasonable excuse to run off for science, which had lifted a small weight off her chest but the little relieved weight had crashed back down with new vigor when she had seen the lab again.

She had called her son to inform both him and Jazz that she and Jack would be either doing experiments or repairing the lab, and encouraging especially Danny to stay the night at a friend's house. She was pretty sure that Phantom's presence made him extremely uncomfortable, and since the ghost was coming to be studied later that day, she didn't think it would be wise to have her son home. Or daughter, because while Jazz was not sensitive to ectoplasm in any way Maddie wanted to be on the safe side and not have either of her children near so powerful ghost if she could avoid it.

Phantom was another thing making Maddie's mood sour; while it would be enlightening to learn more about and from the organic ghost, she had forgotten to tell him when he should show up.

Maddie sighed and quit her pacing. She took her coffee mug which had been left undamaged by the monster of a ghost, and took it upstairs. Considering the covering of ash, soot, and now probably irremovable coffee stains for a moment, she put it in the kitchen sink and took a fresh glass from the cupboard for some water.

After her second glass, her phone rang. She dug it out and checked the caller id, expecting either one of her children or a concerned citizen asking about the mysterious hexagon burned right through the asphalt currently bothering traffic coming to the downtown area. Instead, the place where the number or name of the caller would show was glitching between & and . Maddie stared at the completely unidentified id for three seconds before answering "Maddie Fenton."

The voice coming through was filled with static but still unnervingly recognizable. "Hi Maddie!"

"Phantom?" She couldn't believe it. She was on the phone with a ghost. "I didn't know you had a phone."

A dry laugh came from the other side. "Maddie, I'm a _teen_. Of course I have a phone on me at all times. I wouldn't be caught _dead_ without it." The scientist facepalmed. "In fact, I wasn't."

So, ghosts keep their phones in the afterlife if they are present when they died. "Right. How do you have my number and why is yours static?"

Phantom snorted. "In case you have forgotten, there are fliers stapled to like, every other streetlight pole all over town with information on how to contact you. I think I've seen your number and address in the paper a few times as well. As for my number, no clue. All I know's that if you want to call me back, you gotta save it. Technus might know how ghost phones work but I can't just go and ask him because he hates me."

Maddie sighed. She would of course save the ghost's number for science. "Why did you call me?"

Phantom somehow managed to convey the concept of shrugging through the phone without any kind of sound. "I thought that since we forgot to agree on a time, I'd call instead of just barging in unexpectedly. Wouldn't want to _spook_ you, eh?" The scientist rolled her eyes at the snickering coming from the other end. "Anyways, I was thinking around eight? You'll have enough time to clean the most critical mess and it's not too late if this'll take more time than expected."

Maddie found herself agreeing with the ghost's logic. Huh, a time for everything. "Eight is good. Watch out for the security system." With that, she hung up.

Maddie sighed and ran a hand through her hair. With a few taps on her phone she saved Phantom's nonexistent number, moved her glass into the sink next to the filthy coffee cup and returned to the lab to clean up with her husband.

Three hours, four minor explosions and one plate of fudge later Maddie returned upstairs to wait for the specter soon arriving. She was anxious; following the ghost around or even dragging him to the lab were one thing, but inviting him over at a later time was another thing altogether. She sat on the living room couch, crossed her arms and legs and waited.

Thirteen minutes later her ghost detector beeped and before she could pull it out Phantom's head popped through the carpet. "I thought you'd be in the lab," he grinned.

"I don't want you there right now," Maddie explained and got up as Phantom wholly emerged from the floor and made her way to the kitchen with the ghost in tow.

The ghost nodded. "It is pretty wrecked. Have you considered putting a ghost shield over the portal so this kind of thing didn't happen again?"

Maddie lifted an inquisitive eyebrow. "You purposefully would limit your own access to the Ghost Zone?"

Phantom shrugged. "It would reduce the number of ghosts that accidentally come through by a lot and give the ones that want to wreak havoc hard time getting through. Besides, I probably could still get through."

Yes, of course. Phantom's infamous disappearing act that got him past ghost shields. "How does that work exactly?"

"My molecules rearrange themselves with the transformation halo in a way that allows me to go through ghost shields. I haven't had the time nor desire to look into it any further, although Plasmius might know. He's into gross stuff like that." The ghost made gestures vaguely resembling the double helix structure of DNA. "He probably wouldn't tell that kind of things to a ghost hunter, no offense."

Ah, the enigmatic Plasmius. Maddie _really_ has to make a chart of everything she knows about him. But not now. "Can't you ask him and then tell me?"

The ghost lifted an eyebrow. "No. I know we have a deal, but considering that you've hunted me for almost five years and only had a change of heart less than two months ago, I think it's reasonable that we hold some information to ourselves. It's nothing personal, but the details you're asking could seriously hurt me, him, and others."

Maddie frowned, disappointed, but again could see no flaws in Phantom's logic.

"Besides, when Plasmius gets into the funk of explaining something, he drones on for at least two hours. The more scientific the subject, the longer the speech. You're not asking me to sit through one of those are you?"

Maddie sighed and threw her hand up in resignation. "Alright. I won't."

Dealing with Phantom was frustrating, as wheedling some bits of information from the ghost was harder than getting her son to talk about his black eyes and bruises when he was still being bullied at school. The worst part was that any and every reason the ghost gave her for withholding a piece of information made sense in some way or other, something ghosts were not supposed to do. Sure, Phantom was unique and seemed more human in both appearance and personality than a ghost had any business being, but he was still a ghost.

Speaking of humane appearance...

"Can I take a look at your wounds now?" It was still strange to her to be polite with a ghost even though Phantom might've passed as a human if he stopped glowing and started following the laws of physics. Maddie had to constantly remind herself that the lippy teenager she was dealing with was in fact dead, which frustrated her even more.

Phantom tilted his head a bit at her, as if looking at her thoughts. If he could, he made no comment as he nodded and made the white ring of energy appear around himself again and divide, ridding him of his top. The ghost settled sitting cross-legged on an average chair height so Maddie could easily inspect what was left of the wounds he received earlier in the day.

True to his word, scars were littering his torso and Maddie easily recognized the long line on his shoulder and the one on his stomach he had opened laughing. Most of the burns on his right side had faded away but some parts still had the texture of burn scars. The scars were a pale green color, and as Maddie slowly circled the ghost to look at his back she could see clearly fresher marks on his back that, she was sure of this, weren't there before.

Returning to the specter's front, she wrote down quick and simple notes. "Fascinating, you do scar like a human would but faster."

The ghost grinned his annoying trademark grin. "I told you. Besides, I don't like lying."

Maddie only rolled her eyes and refocused on the green scratches on the ghost's back. "These are new."

Phantom turned his head and stretched his neck to see the damage himself. Maddie mentally cringed at the angle the ghost's neck was at but decided not to comment.

"Oh yeah, those," Phantom said with a hint of chuckle in his voice. "I got tossed around a bit on my way here and landed pretty hard on something sharp."

"You landed hard?" Maddie questioned. "Shouldn't you be bruising?"

Phantom tuned his head back to the direction it was supposed to face and rubbed his neck a bit. "Probably, if I didn't have the suit," he patted his thigh covered with the black material, "It's really not meant to protect against physical harm and doesn't do crap against anything sharp, but it sure can soften a blunt blow. It's kinda like ooblek, but the ectoplasm makes it a lot ooblekier than actual ooblek is."

"Fascinating," Maddie said.

She laid a hand on the ghost's back just below the damage. It was solid as expected, but her protective glove made it impossible to feel the ghost's temperature. Considering the ectoplasm and thus the radiation it emitted was contained within the ghost, it would be possible to actually tough the ghost without protective gloves, but was it a risk she was willing to take?

Absolutely. Maddie slowly took off her right hand glove and laid the hand back to its earlier position.

The ghost felt even more solid like this, but Maddie wasn't focusing on that right now because Phantom was cold. Boy howdy was he cold. She quickly removed her hand.

"Too cool for you, huh?" the ghost grinned, turning in midair to face her.

Maddie checked her hand over; while the ghost really might've just been that cold, there was a chance of radiation burn. Finding nothing, she regloved her hand while making a mental note to monitor the hand later. "Our study on ectoplasm and ectoplasmic entities suggests that ghosts are cold, but this is taking it to the extreme."

"Extreme is my middle name," Phantom said, still wearing that ridiculous grin of his. "Without the hazmat my temperature is below freezing because of my ice core."

Maddie raised an eyebrow. "You're an elemental?"

Phantom rolled his eyes, his body highlighting the motion. "Duh. Haven't you seen me throw ice and snow at my enemies for what, over four years now?"

Maddie almost could've smacked herself in the face. "Of course I have, but or study on elemental ectoplasmic entities suggests elementals only use their element. As you probably know, some non-elemental ghosts can use smaller amounts of elemental power, such as fire or electricity. We thought you were like that, since you use cryokinesis only occasionally."

The ghost nodded thoughtfully. "Yeah, that makes sense." The white halo passed over him again, making his ethereal hazmat whole once more. "Cryokinesis doesn't work that way as far as I know though, fire and electricity are a lot easier to make. Here, look;" Phantom lifted his hand from his lap, electricity arcing and sparking between his fingers, "I can make electricity too. I can't make real fire obviously, but only ghosts with ice cores can make ice. It's pretty rare, outside of Far Frozen that is."

"What is Far Frozen?" Maddie asked.

"It's a remote corner in the Zone, freezing cold and populated by yetis. It's a lovely and welcoming place, if you don't mind the temperature, that is." Phantom took a small pause. "The yetis taught me most of what I know of using cryokinesis."

With the same hand that he had demonstrated electricity, Phantom created a small figure of ice with a flick of his wrist and a blue flash of his eyes. It was small and translucent, but Maddie could see it was a miniature yeti. She had to hold back a gasp of astonishment.

With another flick of his hand Phantom made the figure vanish and it dissipated back into the icy nothingness it had come from. Before the scientist could ask anything more about the yetis or the place they afterlived in, the ghost in front of her backed off a few feet, grinning once more.

"And now, time for the main attraction," the ghost grinned. He spread his arms wide, and with the same disfigured flash of light Maddie had witnessed earlier during the battle, two arms flashed? sprouted? from just below Phantom's armpits. The ghost did jazz hands with his newfound second set of hands. "Partial duplication for party tricks."

Maddie stepped closer to the ghost to observe the new set of arms. It was utterly fascinating; the seamlessness of the hazmat Phantom wore made the areas where the arms connected look natural, as if the ghost had had three pairs of limbs all along. She circled over, only somewhat aware of the amused neon green eyes following her.

She hadn't expected to find anything of interest on the ghost's backside other than maybe the small scratches on the ethereal not-quite fabric knitting themselves shut, but she was met with a second and lower pair of shoulder blades. It made sense, for functional arms vertebrates, or in this case vertebrate-mimicking ectoplasmic entities, needed scapulae. She just hadn't been expecting it, Phantom just kept surprising her time and time again. She nearly ghosted a hand over the ghost's upper back, but successfully fought the temptation down.

Maddie circled back to face Phantom again. "Impressive," she managed to say while keeping a serious face that (hopefully) didn't show how much awe and curiosity she had for what he had just done. "Can you do other things with that than add more arms and reshape the ones you have?"

Phantom pouted at her. "Here I am showing you something I worked hard and long to achieve and you're just Spocking it," he grumbled. "And reshaping limbs is different than duplication, it's... spectral body modification, I think that's the term Plasmius used."

"Alright, two different things," Maddie acknowledged and leaned back on her stance. "So how does duplication work? You said it's hard."

Phantom nodded, and the second pair of arms disappeared in a flash identical to the one that created them. "It's really hard to get the hang of at first," he explained with an undertone that suggested he was going to recount a longer story, "and like everything else it gets easier with practice. For a long while I didn't even know duplication was possible, but then I met Plasmius and he was hell-bent with either teaching me or kicking my butt. He more or less purposefully ended up doing both at the same time, and after a while of him beating me up and taunting me I decided to learn to duplicate myself. It took a really long time to get right, and I couldn't really work around some problems with it until Plasmius and I made a truce and he gave me some pointers."

Phantom paused his tale for a moment to demonstrate complete duplication. Another identical ghost appeared next to the original in a blinding flash of light that was so short Maddie had no time to close her eyes to protect from it, and so bright it left discolored spots floating in her vision. She was glad for the often unpleasant aftermath of looking at too bright things though, because otherwise she would have completely missed the arc of energy connecting the two Phantoms at the chests for the fraction of a second.

"I don't know the science behind this," the freshly created duplicate confessed, "and I don't really care to know. Plasmius probably does because he's a lonely nerd who needs to become a cat lady- honestly, he just needs a few more cats for that- but asking him would be dumb." The original continued: "It's also tricky because the mental effort needed to duplicate is shaped differently for different ghosts."

"Shaped differently?" Maddie repeated in hopes for a clarification.

"Yeah," the original Phantom said. "Different minds, different obsessions, different ways to think. Ghosts are all about the mind, that kind of things affect us a lot." The copy picked up the train of thought: "Trying to do something as hard as duplication by someone else's method is kinda like installing Windows 95 on the latest iPhone."

The original scratched his cheek and formed a spectral tail to flick around like a cat. "I mean... I tried to duplicate myself using Plasmius' method some time ago and it just felt plain wrong. It worked because I'm a pro at it, but it left a bad aftertaste. So yeah, tricky stuff."

Maddie frowned, eyes darting from one Phantom to the other. "But you said Plasmius gave you tips with it."

Both ghosts nodded. "My technique was really rough around the edges and took a lot more effort and energy than necessary," the copy told. "I was honestly fine with it at the time, all my powers were a pain in the butt at first and I figured duplication was just being a little shit. So when Plasmius and I struck a truce he immediately started bugging me about it, like he could see I was doing it the extra hard way. He's a perfectionist of sorts with the power stuff so of course he," the duplicate rolled his eyes dramatically, "could do it like a boss. Anyway, after some trial and error I got it right, and now I can do _this_."

The duplicate Phantom arranged his legs into a lotus position and with an already familiar disfigured flash of light six more arms appeared. Now with a total of eight he held them in positions that gave off a feeling of immense zen. He closed his eyes and said 'ommmmm' in comically stretched voice.

"And this," the original Phantom said, and with a flash that encompassed his entire head and torso grew a second head next to the one already on his shoulders. Maddie had time to close her eyes for the duration of the flash with Phantom's warning, but she missed which one of the heads was the original and which one the duplicate. It probably doesn't matter, she thought as she watched the two heads grin at each other and high five.

"How does that work?" Maddie asked and gestured at the two-headed ghost's arms. "Does each head control one arm or does the original control both?"

Both of the heads turned to her. If Phantom's stare had been unnerving before, twice the eyes in one body sent shivers down Maddie's spine. "The two heads aren't really separate," the right head told. "I still have one mind, it just happens to be in two heads."

"It's a closer version of the bond all duplicates share," the left head continued. "Having duplicates is like having more arms and legs and everything, but you also have more brains to move it all. There's a lot more stuff on your mind all the time but it's never too much."

"That's why partial duplication is harder than whole duplication once you get the hang of it," the eight-armed duplicate said. "In complete duplication, everything is in balance and you have enough mind for the body. But right now, I have way too much body for my mind and that guy-" he jabbed three thumbs at the two-headed Phantom "-has way too much mind for his body."

"But since I'm all connected to myself, I'm using some of this body's mental capacity to control that body's body," the original's right head finished. Maddie wasn't too sure she followed, but she nodded nonetheless. If that was as clear as Phantom was going to get, she'd have better luck thinking what she'd heard over in peace than asking to hear it again.

The two disfigured Phantoms merged together in the brightest flash of light so far that left behind one sole Phantom with the correct number of limbs and heads. The ghost immediately molded is legs into a flickering tail, though.

"Can you change the size of your duplicates or extra limbs?" Maddie asked.

Phantom scrunched up his face in thought. "I don't think so," he said after a beat. "I haven't tried it, yet at least. I'm probably too solid for that." Another thinking pause. "I might be able to do it with practice, but not right now. Not a week from now. Maybe a month, if I really got into it, but that's a pretty big if."

"Could a less solid ghost do it in less time?" Maddie asked.

"Depends."

"On what?"

"Everything. A ghost with suitable motivations, needs, and pre-existing skills probably both could and would, and I've seen something like that happen a lot. Walker does it all the time to intimidate everyone else, but that could also be just an-"

Phantom's speech stopped dead and for a second Maddie thought the ghost had again crossed one of the immaterial boundaries he had set for himself to guard his privacy, but the ghost was clearly listening intently to something she couldn't hear and raised his hand as a signal to be quiet. He turned his head to a few directions on short intervals like he was trying to pinpoint the source of a faint repetitive sound. Then his eyes trained on the floor. For some reason that sent chills through Maddie's body.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Something's wrong in the lab," Phantom said.

Then, like Phantom had summoned it by mentioning it, a distorted roar sounded from the room below them, instantly followed by the very familiar sound of ecto-weapons firing. Maddie and Phantom shared a split-second alarmed look before the ghost grabbed her by the arm and phased them down through the floor.

Down in the lab Jack was fending off what looked like a miniature version of the elemental volcanic monster Phantom had more or less destroyed earlier that day. It was hunching over a mess of broken sample containers, and big sharp glass shards were sticking out of its back like a container had broken from the inside and the pieces had been caught by and gotten embedded in rapidly expanding mass. Its mouths were dripping searing hot ectoplasm that sizzled on the floor below it, and the scorched ectoplasmic flesh around the slowly melting glass shards was bleeding the same thing, as if the wounds were weeping acidic pus.

Maddie immediately grabbed the nearest weapon (a rifle she had been carrying around town earlier) and shot at the sulfur-smelling monstrosity. To her immense satisfaction it screeched in agony as the shots hit it squarely between the foaming mouths, but the thing was otherwise unaffected and retaliated by flinging three tentacle arms towards Maddie. The arms were nothing compared to what they had been when the ghost had rampaged in town, but they were still thicker than Maddie's thighs and moved faster than she could dodge. She tried to cover her head and face from the incoming attack with her arms and Jack called her name in alarm, but instead of her the tentacles hit a transparent and glowing green shield with a sickening squelch.

Maddie looked up just in time to see Phantom fling his arms around his head in one fluid motion and trap the other ghost screaming in anger and frustration in a sealed bubble of ethereal green. With the immediate threat of dying gone, Maddie hunched over and leaned on her knees and sighed in relief. Jack rushed over to her from halfway across the trashed lab to check that she was alright.

"Thanks Phantom," he chuckled. "I would've been toast if you hadn't come when you did." The ghost nodded in acknowledgement.

"I thought you killed that thing," Maddie sharply addressed the friendlier of the two ghosts in the room. The remaining adrenaline from the volcanic ghost's sudden appearance was dwindling and coalescing into an emotion of some kind, and Maddie chose to project that emotion as anger towards Phantom for indirectly endangering not only her but her husband's lives as well by insufficiently dealing with the threat earlier. Deep down she knew it wasn't Phantom's fault, but it was easy to blame a ghost for everything when something like this happened.

"I don't kill things," Phantom defended himself against Maddie's irritated tone. "If I'd known that thing could regenerate from a core shard that quickly I would have chucked it into the far reaches of the Ghost Zone right after!"

"A core shard?" Maddie repeated. "You mean it broke into several pieces and each will regenerate into a new one?" Nothing in their research suggested that a ghost with a core that damaged could do anything other than perish.

"No, I don't think there will be more than one," Phantom said as he stared at the very angry cloud of unearthly plasma seething in the bubble of green energy with observing eyes. "Either that regenerated from a really big piece, like a half a core or more, or several smaller shards fused together."

"That goes against everything we've discovered about ghost cores."

"Maybe, but that just happened." Phantom sighed. "Now, you're not gonna like this, but this guy is way too dangerous to be held captive to be studied in a place like this. I know a few places in the Ghost Zone where it'd be harmless…"

"So you're going to take our test subject, just like that?" Maddie asked with a sharp accusing tone.

Phantom looked her directly in the eyes with a look she might have described as 'haunted' had she not been sure the ghost would've gotten a kick out of the pun of it. "Yes."

"You can't do that."

"I have to. It blew itself up once and it's already regenerating that much- it can do it again. You live upstairs."

As much as she wanted to, Maddie just couldn't find a counterargument against that. Not when Phantom's usually so cheerful expression had turned stone serious, and the haunted look was still there. Not when the ghost was so concerned for her, a ghost hunter's, safety. "Please, let me take it to the Zone."

Maddie sighed, all fight leaving her as she breathed out and all the weariness from the eventful day settled on her shoulders. "Fine," she said eventually. "Take it."

"Thank you," Phantom said and lifted the sphere containing the angry elemental ghost in front of him without touching it. He floated over to the closed portal which opened for the ghost when he approached, something the portal was definitely _not_ supposed to do. She'd have to check the programming. Phantom was half through the portal when he paused, turned back, and gave the two Fentons a cheery salute.

"See you around," he said, and disappeared into the swirling green vortex.

Maddie sighed again. Even without a ghost to study, there was a lot to do.

 **AN: I'm sorry this took two years. The series ends here.**

 **Update: The series does not end here. I got another idea**


End file.
